After all the preparations,
Fit and solemn were effected,*
Which in such a perilous case
Might be needed and expected,
And when I from all around me,
Firm in faith, with courage strengthened,
Tenderly farewell had taken
This dark cavern here to enter,
I my trust reposed in God,
And my lips repeating ever
Those mysterious, mystic words,
At which even the demons tremble,
I then placed me on the threshold,
Where, until, as I expected,
They would close the gate, I stood.
It was closed, and I remember
Then I found me in black night,
Whence the light was so ejected,
That I closed on it mine eyes.
(A strange way it seems, but certain
To see better in the dark.)
With my lids thus closed together
On I went, and felt a wall
Which in front of me extended;
And by following it, and groping
For about the length of twenty
Paces, came upon some rocks,
And perceived through a small crevice
Of this rugged mountain wall
That a doubtful glimmer entered
Of a light that was not light,
As when the day the dark disperses,
If 'tis morning, or not morning,
Oft the twilight is uncertain.
With light steps a path pursuing,
By the left-hand side I entered,
When I felt a strange commotion;
The firm earth began to tremble,
And upheaving 'neath my feet,
Ruin and convulsion threatened.
Stupified I stopped there, when
With a voice which woke my senses
From forgetfulness and fainting,
Loud a thunder-clap re-echoed,
And the ground on which I stood
Bursting open in the centre,
It appeared as if I fell
To a depth where I lay buried
In the loosened stones and earth
Which had after me descended.
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